Kenneth Berding, Walking in the Spirit (Wheaton: Crossway, 2011), 48–51:
[P]utting to death the deeds of the body is active. There is no passivity here.
I grew up in a church setting that was
into “higher life” teaching. This teaching goes by many different names,
including “victorious Christian living,” “the exchanged life,” and “the
crucified life.” A particular stream of higher life teaching that
continues to be influential is known as the Keswick Movement (pronounced
KES-ik), named after an annual Bible conference that has been taking
place in Keswick, England, each year since the late nineteenth century.
One key aspect of higher life teaching is probably traceable even
further back to a movement referred to as Quietism, which was popular in
Italy, France, and Spain during the seventeenth century. If you aren’t
familiar with any of these labels, it is still likely that you are
familiar with a slogan that gets used in connection with various strands
of this teaching: “Let Go and Let God.” Said differently, the key to
the Christian life is to “let go of reliance on yourself and let God do
the work in you.”
So much of what is taught in evangelical higher life circles is right
and helpful, and I want to affirm much of it. The emphasis on
surrendering oneself to Christ, the importance placed upon overcoming
sin and living in holiness, and the awareness of the need for empowering
by the Holy Spirit to defeat sin, spread the good news, and live a life
pleasing to God are all praiseworthy. Higher life emphases have also
been affirmed by many who have been catalysts for significant missionary
thrusts during the past couple centuries. Actually, the reason it
sometimes gets referred to as “higher life” teaching is because these
brothers and sisters are unwilling to settle for the mediocrity they see
among so many professing Christians. They know that the Scriptures
teach something better. On these
points, for sure, I could not agree more. Keep Reading...
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